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Ryan gives interview on This Morning about suffering from Tourette’s syndrome (Picture: ITV)

A brave Tourette’s sufferer has appeared on This Morning to reveal what it’s like to live with the syndrome.

Ryan first started to notice something wrong when he was just 15. A combination of hitting puberty and the pressure of school and GCSEs led Ryan to begin suffering from intense headaches and migraines.

‘They classed it as cluster migraines, and that was all they put it down to,’ he told Phil Schofield and Holly Willoughby.

Ryan only suffered his first vocal tic last year (Picture: Channel 5)

‘[One day] I was doing a drama performance and told the teacher I needed to get to the medical room,’ he said. He then described how it felt like a balloon had burst.

‘My head started twitching and off to hospital I go. They put me through tests for tumours, to see if anything wasn’t working in my brain,’ he explained. ‘They classed it as teenage kicks as I didn’t have vocal tics at that point.’

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Ryan said the first vocal tics hit him just over a year ago, when he felt unwell at work and was offered a glass of water.

‘I said “no you can die of thirst”. It was very shocking, I thought at first I was going mad.’

Ryan has struggled to get a job (Picture: Channel 5)

He also explained what it feels like to try and suppress the tics, which saw him call Phil a ‘knob’ during the interview.

‘The only way I can describe it is if you want to sneeze and someone says you’re not allowed to. That’s what ti feels like to constantly suppress it,’ he said.

Ryan also shared a devastating story with Holly and Phil of how he had been mocked for the condition while walking around a shop – by the shop assistance who mimicked his tics.

He was later called back by the manager and asked to educate the staff at the store on disabilities.

Tourette’s syndrome is a neurological condition affecting the brain and nervous system, and is characterised by a combination of involuntary noises and movements called tics. It’s often diagnosed in childhood.

Ryan has struggled to get a job since his diagnosis, and will now be appearing in Employable Me, which airs Mondays 9pm on BBC Two.